Clarins unifies marketing insights globally with M13h and Funnel

Executive summary:

Clarins, a global leader in skincare and makeup, partnered with M13h to unify its fragmented marketing data across international operations. By integrating seamlessly into Clarins’ tech stack, Funnel provided a scalable, user-friendly platform that consolidated media investments into a single source of truth and delivered a consistent view of performance across markets.

The implementation streamlined reporting, reduced manual work, and empowered both technical and non-technical teams to manage data independently. With a clear path for expansion, Clarins now has the infrastructure and insight to align global strategies, improve budget pacing, and make confident, data-driven decisions at scale.

Key results:

• Unified media data across 7 key markets, creating a single source of truth for global and local teams.
• 500+ users aligned on one global performance platform, improving collaboration and decision-making.
• Streamlined budget pacing and performance tracking across markets with harmonized data and shared KPIs.

Partner profile:

M13h, a data consultancy based in Paris, Lyon and Madrid, specializes in leveraging data to help their clients improve their marketing performance. Known for their client-focused approach, M13h helps brands optimize complex data flows and streamline performance reporting.

Company profile:

Clarins, headquartered in Paris, France, is renowned for its selective skincare and cosmetics, sold in over 150 countries. With an emphasis on innovative, sustainable beauty solutions, Clarins is a trusted brand among global consumers and retailers alike.

The challenge: Fragmented and non uniform marketing data

For global brands, managing marketing data across multiple regions is a common challenge. Local markets often operate independently, engaging with various agencies and using different reporting formats, schedules, and tools. This fragmentation makes it very time consuming  for brand headquarters to unify data structures, aggregate results, or gain a clear global view of marketing performance. Without an harmonized approach, brands struggle to align strategies, share insights across regions, and make timely, data-driven decisions.

Clarins faced these very challenges. With up to five agencies engaged per market, each delivering reports at different intervals and in heterogeneous formats  and a vast range of digital channels providing their own truth on performance, it becomes increasingly difficult both for local & global to track 360° marketing spend, measure performance, and take strategic decisions.

To tackle this, Clarins partnered with M13h, a data consultancy, to implement a scalable, API-driven cloud solution. Jonathan Dupasquier, Director at M13h, explained: "The ambition was to build a global overview that provides complete visibility into all media investments and their impact, aligning data from global strategies down to local executions."

The solution: Building a scalable, user-friendly data ecosystem with Funnel

To address Clarins’ challenges with fragmented data and diverse reporting, M13h proposed a modern data architecture that prioritized flexibility, scalability, and long-term ownership. The architecture required an ETL solution capable of extracting data from multiple media platforms, transforming it for analysis, and integrating seamlessly into Clarins’ cloud-based data warehouse. This approach would ensure a robust foundation for global reporting while empowering both technical and non-technical teams.

Initially, M13h and Clarins considered a range of ETL tools during an RFI process, evaluating each against the needs of the project. According to Marine Grimal, Senior consultant at M13h “We worked with three other competitors of Funnel. Based on functionality, pricing, support, and connector catalog, we selected the tool that best aligned with Clarins’ needs.”

Funnel emerged as the ideal choice for its extensive library of connectors, user-friendly interface, and focus on handling media-specific data. Unlike traditional ETL tools that often require technical expertise, Funnel allowed less-technical stakeholders, such as Clarins’ head Media performance & Data, to independently connect data sources and update rules, ensuring greater autonomy over time.

Jonathan Dupasquier, highlighted why Funnel was a strong fit:

“Funnel’s straightforward usability and focus on core capabilities was key to us. It was critical for the solution to empower Clarins’ internal teams to manage their data independently, while also being flexible enough to accommodate the diverse media platforms used across all its regions.”

By incorporating Funnel into the broader architecture, M13h successfully established a global reporting framework for Clarins. Funnel’s clear role within the system ensured data from over 20 connectors per country was aggregated efficiently and aligned with Clarins’ business rules. This foundation enabled a seamless handover to Clarins’ internal teams while providing a scalable solution for future growth and innovation.

The results: A global overview of performance

With Funnel at the core of its data architecture, Clarins has transformed fragmented reporting into a unified, scalable system. The rollout across seven key markets now provides a single source of truth for media investments, consolidating data from over 20 connectors per country. This has enabled local teams to easily access a 360° view of their investment and operate strategic choice to improve their performance as well as headquarters to gain a comprehensive view of global marketing performance, aligning strategies and driving more informed decisions.

The initial implementation has also created a clear blueprint for integrating the remaining markets, ensuring a smooth and efficient expansion. By automating data collection and harmonization, Clarins has significantly reduced manual workloads, allowing teams to focus on optimizing campaigns rather than fixing data inconsistencies.

Funnel’s intuitive platform has empowered less-technical stakeholders, to manage and adapt the system independently. This autonomy has strengthened internal capabilities, reduced reliance on external support, and ensured that actionable insights are always at the team’s fingertips. Jonathan Dupasquier summarized it best: “Funnel enabled Clarins to unify its reporting and deliver actionable insights efficiently, with a system that’s built to scale.”